NINOVE, Belgium - Hoover Color, a division of CATHAY INDUSTRIES, and Ecoat, a French developer of biobased chemistry for the coatings industry, have started a collaborative project to develop coatings formulations on the basis of environmentally friendly raw materials. In this project, Hoover Color is responsible for the pigments, and Ecoat contributes the binder products.

“Our target for this collaboration is to actively open up new markets for CATHAY’s product range in Europe and other regions that have a strong tendency towards environmentally friendly applications. As highly innovative industry partners, Ecoat and Hoover Color strengthen our performance driven by the intention to act in an environmentally conscious way,” said Axel Schneider, CEO CATHAY INDUSTRIES Europe.

CATHAY’s new American division, Hoover Color, is a pioneer in the field of sustainable pigments. The company is one of the market leaders in naturally occurring semitransparent raw and burnt umbers, as well as in eco-friendly transparent iron oxides for the paint and coatings industry. Hoover Color recovers iron oxides from abandoned coal mining drainage and converts waste streams into transparent EnvironOxide^® pigments. Through this unique process, wastewaters are purified and the solid substances are turned into high-quality pigments.

Ecoat pursues a strategy similar to Hoover Color’s in order to develop binders for waterborne coatings. By using biobased raw materials and designing production processes with significantly reduced energy consumption, the company develops and produces biosourced emulsions for architectural paints on the basis of patented technologies.